Que Sera Sera
by pickledegg
Summary: AU: As punishment for their crimes, the Capitol must send twenty-four of their children to compete in the final, 76th Hunger Games.
1. A Prelude

**I** sigh and stretch my arm out to get a good look at the newly applied layer of nail polish. Pink just isn't my color, which is a shame because it's one of the best colors in the world. If it had been a normal day, I'd have gotten my nail polish remover out of the drawer and scoured the pink off my nails, but for the past few weeks imported items have been few and far between. I suppose I could find some in my mother's bathroom, but she only gets it Capitol made and if you use that putrid stuff, it takes ages to get rid of the smell. No thank you!

Sitting on the edge of my bed is my little brother, Twinkle. We've never been very friendly to each other since he got out of diapers, but he has become less… twerp-ish since the War started. He's afraid for our family, our Capitol, and our country. I tell him that it's pointless to be afraid, because the Captiol is stronger than District 13 and the rebels and that, if we beat them once, we can beat them again. Twinkle has his large, blue eyes glued on the window, his face has been expressionless for the past half-hour, but now a wrinkle crosses his brow as he screws up his face in confusion.

"They're happy," he says.

I raise a carefully plucked eyebrow and push off the wall to propel my chair to the window. The refugees that have been crowding the streets for the past week are no longer hunched over in defeat, they are looking at each other and their cheers are bouncing off the pastel buildings. I roll over to my bedside table and crank up the volume on my radio.

"… –dent Snow has been arrested and is to be held on trial–" I immediately switch it off in horror. Our president has been arrested. We've lost.

Twinkle looks like he might faint –we've lost. I hear my father call from downstairs, but I'm too stunned to respond. We've lost, how did we loose? Why are the refugees outside happy? It was the Rebellion that made them refugees, but now they are rejoicing.

I stare at the pink on my nails. I thought that when the War was over, I'd be able to remove it using my favorite brand of nail polish remover from District 1, the kind that smells like grass and just needs to barely touch the polish before it slurps it off. But I don't think that's going to happen. I'll have to resort to my mother's nasty kind if I don't want the nail polish to chip off.

* * *

**Five **days have passed since President Snow's execution –a week since we lost the War– and now my family gathers around the television in our living room to watch President Coin's speech. Life has been more or less the same since the end of the War, but my dad says that we'll have to move soon. With the new government and those from the Districts moving into the Capitol, it has become dangerous for those native to the Capitol; just last week they found a family dead in their home, all five of them murdered. It's common knowledge that their new neighbors from District 7 did it.

I'm immediately snapped out of my thoughts as President Coin appears. She's different than how I thought she'd be; she's cold and frightening. I was expecting someone elderly, but strong and warm and hopeful. I know now that Coin won't help us against the anti-Capitol sentiment, I can tell just by looking at her that she didn't start the War to bring equality to Panem, she started it to annihilate us.

"A new era of Panem has begun," she starts, "It will be an era of peace and prosperity, and I'm afraid that there have been too many blemishes in our history to let the Capitol get by without being punished for their crimes against humanity. As punishment for their crimes, the Capitol must send twenty-four of their children to compete in a final, 76th Hunger Games–"

There are cries of outrage from the television and I feel numb inside. Coin fixes the audience and camera with a calm stare. She knew this would happen.

"–The Capitol has killed hundreds of our children, thousands if you include the mistreatment of the Districts, and if twenty-three of their children have to die so there will finally be peace, then so be it." My dad turns the TV off.

"They will only want more blood," he shakes his head sadly before leaving.

My mother puts her head in her hands and doesn't say a word.

* * *

**author's note**: Idea I've had since I finished Mockingjay. I wrote five rough draft chapters, but I've been having a lack of inspiration for the past few months for this story, so I cleaned them up and decided to post them. Maybe inspiration will strike?


	2. Let The Games Begin!

**"Lacey **Valentine."

It takes me several moments to realize that it is _my _name that rings in the silent park where we are gathered– that _I_, of all people,shall be representing Sector 6 of the Capitol in the 76th Hunger Games. It must be a mistake, I'm nobody, it should've been Mina Bee, whose been bragging for the past year that as soon as we're done with school she's going to become a stylist, that her parents have it all set up for her; she's exotic, with haunting grey eyes and a nose that juts like a birds beak (not too large to be hideous, not too small to be passed over). Or Hazel Lovelace who has the most beautiful voice in the world, whenever people hear her sing they whisper '_She's something special_.' No one has ever said that about me.

A girl standing besides me (later I will be able to identify her as Ada Bell) gives my hand a squeeze before I'm ushered to the stage where Bachus Cable gives me a sad stare. He did not ask for this job, but he is the strongest person that anyone in my neighborhood knows, he would not break down in tears as two children he watched grow up are selected as Tributes. I try to stand like stone, I had watched plenty of Tributes do it, and find impossible; I start to shake and feel the tears spill out of my eyes. I am soft and fragile, I was not born to fight or to survive; I was born to be beautiful and to laugh and to be safe.

Bachus Cable digs his hand into the bowl of boy names, I see him flinch slightly as he does it– he has two boys of his own. Slowly, he pulls out a slip of paper. His fingers tremble as he unfolds it.

"Pallas Biggs," he reads and the part of me that clings to what life was a month ago wilts slightly –Pallas will not sweep me off my feet in a romance of the ages– while an icy feeling dances in my belly; Pallas is three years my junior, only thirteen, he is Twinkle's best friend and the second brother I never (thank God) had.

And we're both going to die.

* * *

**The **Guardsmen immediately herd Pallas, Bachus, and me into a truck –everyone knows they are just grey versions of the Peacekeeprs– we are not allowed to say goodbye to our friend and family. _At least previous tributes were allowed a final goodbye_, I think miserably, before I burst into tears.

It is a quick ride to the Capitol Square, seven other vehicles are parked nearby and fourteen Tributes stand in a line before fourteen Guardsmen. Pallas and I are quickly wedged in between Tributes from Sectors 5 and 8, 7 has yet to arrive, and we wait and wait and wait for what seems like ages until a twelfth truck parks (finally) and the Tributes from Sector 10 are placed in line. The icy pang resumes its Lindy Hop when I realize they are both around twelve.

The line of Guardsmen splits down the middle and a severe looking woman steps forward. President Coin studies us in turn with her hard grey eyes and her lips quirk slightly like she is about to say something, but she remains silent. She walks down our line and I seize up when her eyes rest on me for a brief second, before they move on to male Tribute from Sector 5. She reaches the cluster of adults who had plucked our names out of bowls and a young woman with shocking blue hair spits on Coin's grey shoes.

"You claim that you're going to help us," the woman growled, "When Capitol families are being prosecuted every day!"

Coin raises an eyebrow. "All's fair," she says and nods at the Guardsmen. Two of them break rank and grab the protestor.

They shoot her on the bricks in front of us. Her blood speckles the tips of my shoes and I go lightheaded. A girl in line whimpers, she and the young woman have the same face.

Not another sound is uttered, but a thought is shared unanimously by all: The 76th Hunger Games have begun.

* * *

**author's note**:May the odds be _ever_ in your favor!


End file.
